


receive and connect

by artenon



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, First years as third years, Gen, Post-Canon, Pre-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-06-22
Updated: 2018-06-22
Packaged: 2019-05-26 17:25:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,508
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15005756
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/artenon/pseuds/artenon
Summary: He can do this. He can have a normal conversation with his brother.Even though volleyball had been everything, the common denominator bridging the six years between them.(over the years, 3 graduations)





	receive and connect

**Author's Note:**

> another sportsfest prompt fill for bonus round 1!
> 
> kei & akiteru, featuring third year tsukki who has mellowed out and loves his stupid friends because first year friendship cuddlepile is everything to me
> 
> Prompt:  
> TIME: just before dawn, on graduation day  
> PLACE: a doorway

Kei wakes up ridiculously early and can’t fall back asleep. It’s silly to be so excited, but he can’t help it. His brother is about to graduate middle school, and then he’s going to go to Karasuno, a powerhouse school. It’s gonna be awesome. Akiteru was captain and ace at Amemaru, and he’s going to shine at Karasuno. He imagines going to see Akiteru in competition, wearing Karasuno’s colors, and he covers his face in embarrassed joy. All the university scouts are gonna want him when he’s a third year.

Kei definitely can’t fall back asleep now. He sits up and gropes around for his glasses on the nightstands. After he slides them on, he hops down from his bed and pads to the kitchen for a glass of water. He stops in the doorway, though, when he sees Akiteru already at the table.

He tries to shrink back, but Akiteru has already noticed him.

“Hey, Kei. Shouldn’t you be sleeping?”

“Couldn’t sleep,” Kei mumbles. He hates how childish it sounds. It’s not even his own graduation.

“Excited for your big brother?” Akiteru teases, and Kei flushes.

“No,” he says, even though it’s no use lying to Akiteru. He was just going to get water and then go back to bed, but since Akiteru is here… He fidgets. “Do you have to go yet?”

“I’ve got time,” Akiteru says, standing. “Want to practice receives?”

“Does it have to be receives?” Kei asks, even though he’s already crossing to the front door.

Akiteru catches him partway and pulls him into a noogie. “Yes. I keep telling you, you have to work on them!”

Kei laughs through his protests and pushes him off, and runs ahead to grab the volleyball. 

* * *

 Kei peers out the window, keeping his head as low as possible so as to quickly duck out of sight should Akiteru turn his head. It’s still dark out, with only a small break of light on the horizon, and Akiteru is out in the backyard in his Karasuno Volleyball Club jacket, spiking a volleyball against the wall. Kei would like to accuse the rhythmic _thump thump thump_ of waking him, but the truth is he’s been awake since before he heard the creak of Akiteru’s bedroom door opening a few minutes ago.

 He hasn’t had a proper conversation with Akiteru since… Since that day. He can’t even look Akiteru in the eye anymore, just quickly shovels down dinner even though he hates eating fast and excuses himself to his room, citing the need to finish homework, and ignores the hesitant taps on his door that stopped weeks ago.

But Akiteru is graduating today, and he’ll be going away to college soon, and even though they don’t talk like they used to, even though he lied to Kei, Akiteru is still his brother and he still loves him and—

Kei swallows hard against the lump in his throat.

He doesn’t care about what happened.

He knows he’s lying to himself, but he’s going to repeat it until it becomes true. He doesn’t care, because it was just a club, and volleyball is just a sport, and it didn’t mean anything in the end.

Kei exits his bedroom and makes for the back door. He can do this. He can have a normal conversation with his brother.

Even though volleyball had been everything, the common denominator bridging the six years between them.

Kei hesitates, his hand on the doorknob. He’ll just congratulate Akiteru and (if he’s feeling brave enough) tell him he’ll miss him, and then excuse himself before Akiteru can do something stupid, like try to Talk About It. Stupid, because it’s in the past, and it doesn’t matter anymore. Kei doesn’t care anymore.

Akiteru’s going to leave, and Kei is going to be able to stop thinking about it. He doesn’t really want to play volleyball in middle school but Yamaguchi wants to. Yamaguchi’s kind of shy about asking other people to practice with him, but Kei loathes the idea of wasting his free time on extra practice now. He almost decided not to play in middle school at all, but that would mean admitting that what had happened mattered, and (as Kei is tired of telling himself) it didn’t.

The door pulls open unexpectedly, and Kei stumbles forward, hand still curled around the knob, and he collides into Akiteru in the doorway.

He didn’t even realize the sound of the volleyball hitting the side of the house had stopped.

“Kei—”

Kei doesn’t stick around to hear anything else, turning and bolting back to his bedroom, pulling his door firmly shut behind him, just short of slamming it.

He throws himself onto his bed and presses his face into his pillow, praying that Akiteru won’t come knocking.

Minutes pass, and he doesn’t.

Kei sighs, rolling over and staring at the ceiling. That was stupid of him. He hasn’t been able to talk to Akiteru in weeks, what made him think he would be able to now?

He wouldn’t have been able to say _I’ll miss you_ to Akiteru when he already misses him now and can’t do anything about it even though he’s right there.

Kei screws his eyes shut. It’ll be better once Akiteru’s away.

The steady thumping of a volleyball hitting the wall starts up again.

It’s also going to be quieter. Kei can’t decide if he likes that or not.

* * *

Kei wishes he was unconscious. He needs to get up soon anyway, but he fell asleep way too late last night and he would take what precious few minutes he can get, if only he was in any position to actually get any rest.

Kageyama’s head is heavy on his chest, and he’s drooling all over Kei’s shirt. Gross. Hinata has somehow ended up lying perpendicular to the rest of him, his leg stretching over Kageyama and ending up on Kei’s stomach. Kei cranes his neck up and looks further down the bed. Yachi’s body is curved around Hinata’s head, somehow fast asleep even though Hinata is snoring up a storm, and Yamaguchi spoons her from behind.

Kei’s saving grace is that he’s on the edges of one of the two futons they’d pushed together in his room. Kageyama and Hinata can sleep through pretty much anything, and that includes Kei pushing Kageyama’s head off and lifting Hinata’s leg up so he can roll off the bed. Hinata’s leg curls loosely against Kageyama’s stomach. Kageyama grumbles a little in his sleep, fingers twitching. Kei puts a pillow where he’d been laying, and Kageyama’s arms lock around it.

Kei bites his lip against a smile. He can’t believe how ridiculously fond he’s grown of these guys—all of them.

On the other hand, they did invade his house the day before graduation because they all wanted to go together even though they would see each other there and still hang out whenever they could, and then proceeded to keep him and themselves up late talking about every topic under the sun.

He tiptoes out of the room, shutting the door softly.

He isn’t really surprised to see Akiteru in the living room. Something in him almost expected it.

“Hey,” Akiteru says with a gentle smile as Kei approaches. “I heard you guys up way late last night. Don’t tell me you’re so excited you can’t sleep?”

“Not at all,” Kei says. “It was too crowded in my room, that’s all.”

“You say that, but I know you love them! I’m so glad my little brother finally made more friends than just Tadashi,” Akiteru says, wiping away a fake tear.

Or it could be real. Who knows with Akiteru, really, he’s ridiculous.

“Captain of the Karasuno volleyball team, the pillar of their defense, read-blocking on par with Datekou’s best—” Akiteru rattles off, and Kei cuts him off with a hiss.

“Shut up.”

Akiteru really will start crying at this rate. He’s so embarrassing.

“I’m just so proud of you,” Akiteru says. He shifts, and suddenly looks uncomfortable. “And, about back then, I’m—”

“Don’t,” Kei says. “I don’t want to talk about it. And not because I’m repressing it or in denial or anything like that. Just. I’ve forgiven you, and I don’t want to talk about it. Not today.”

Akiteru looks at him thoughtfully for a moment. Finally, he says, “Okay.” Then, “Want to go in the backyard and do some receives? For old time’s sake.”

Kei is kind of worried that the mere sound of a volleyball, even through closed doors and windows, will reach Kageyama and Hinata’s freakish volleyball-centric animal senses, and they’ll wake up, and they’ll want to join in, and probably somehow convince everyone to play a 3-on-3 since Yachi has gotten pretty decent at volleyball basics, even though they have no net and insufficient backyard space and God, his best friends are exhausting.

But a lot has changed, and Kei loves his friends and he loves volleyball and he loves his brother, and he meets Akiteru’s smile with his own and says, “Sure.”


End file.
